Field of the Invention: This invention relates to medical tubing retaining devices and more particularly to a one-piece band forming a sling to retain coiled medical tubing that extends outwardly from or along a patient's body.
Description of the Prior Art: Certain types of medical devices, such as indwelling catheters and other access tubes, are implanted into a patient's abdomen, chest cavity, stomach, blood vessel or the like. These devices sometimes include tubing and in the case of a peritoneal dialysis catheter, project outwardly from the implanted medical device relative to the skin. Patients have to contend with somehow immobilizing this medical tubing that may vary in length, according to the treatment protocol, from about 12 inches to about 30 inches and may include the use of extension or transfer sets for fluid infusion or drainage. The skin exit site is also susceptible to pulling, tugging or other tractions on the catheter or tubing. To avoid problems a patient may typically roll up and tape the catheter and transfer set to the surrounding skin.
To avoid taping the medical device to the patient's skin, certain garments, including means to hold indwelling catheters, have been disclosed. See, e.g., Pavelka, U.S. Pat. No. 4,582,508 and McNeish et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,666,432. These garments consist of several components such as straps and pockets. In these garments the tubing is threaded through a hole and is retained in a pocket. None of these garments, however, is commercially available; presumably, they are not available because of cost to manufacture multi-component garments and the difficulty of use associated with threading tubing through a hole into a pocket. The present one piece device solves the aforementioned problems by providing a sling to retain the coiled medical tubing.